Better than Being Alone
by starrnobella
Summary: They were both stuck working on Christmas instead of celebrating with their families. Luckily they had one another to keep them company. COMPLETE


**A/N: **We are getting closer to closer to the holiday and I'm loving seeing all of the holiday stories that have been coming out in the last couple of weeks. Puts me right in the Christmas spirit.

My fourth story for the collection was prompted by the lovely thescarletphoenixx. The prompt was: Christmas is Character A is stuck working in a coffee shop on Christmas Day and Character B is the lonely soul spending their whole day there.

I love a good coffee shop AU and I wanted to avoid this story being similar to another Christmas coffee shop AU that I have written in the past.

I hope that thescarletphoenixx enjoys this story and likes what I've done with her prompt as well as all of the other readers who happen to pick up this story.

I hope you're feeling festive because there are a lot more stories yet to come!

Love always,  
~starr

* * *

Draco stared at the apron hanging beside the front door of his flat. Who in their right mind agrees to work on Christmas Day? The coffee shop was going to be practically empty all day long since ordinary people would be spending time with their loved ones, opening presents, and celebrating family.

He glanced over his shoulder at the ragged photo on the mantle of the fireplace. That picture was taken the last time he had gone home for the holidays before his mother had passed away. With his father locked up in Azkaban, his mother had brought to the life of a spinster, refusing to leave the Malfoy Manor. So while she was living, Draco would spend his time at the Manor, but now he preferred to keep himself busy.

So he agreed to work on Christmas Day so that his boss and the rest of the staff of Java Sweets could spend the day with their loved ones. Draco sighed and hung his head as he reached for the apron and made his way out the door. Hopefully, the place would be rather quiet today, and he'd be able to get some writing done rather than dealing with crazy customers who wanted a triple, non-fat, skinny vanilla latte with extra whipped cream or whatever other crazy concoctions they could come up with.

Wrapping his scarf around his neck, Draco braved his way out into the cold and the snow. As pretty as a White Christmas was, it didn't make the commute to the coffee shop easy. He had to be careful not to slip in the slush that had piled up on the sidewalks and the splashing puddles as cars drove past him on the road.

He quickened his pace and made it to work in about fifteen minutes. Hanging his coat up in the back, Draco made his way to the front of the store and started the process of opening up the shop. He flipped the neon "Open" sign on and unlocked the front door. He shook his head as he realized it was probably completely pointless to do this, but he was expected to open the shop even if he knew it was going to be empty all day long.

With a heavy sigh, Draco made his way from the front door to behind the counter and busied himself with paperwork that had been left by the crew who worked last night. At least they had taken care of the receipts like they are supposed to do at the end of each night. It looked like all he needed to do was finish organizing everything so that the very few receipts he would have today could be slipped away easily.

While he was focused on the tedious paperwork in front of him, the rest of the world seemed to fade away. He knew he hadn't been working long, but paperwork always appeared to be a never-ending task. He was so focused that he never heard the front door ring when the door opened and closed.

Ginny noticed Draco standing behind the counter hunched over, and she chuckled to herself. He had no idea a customer had just walked inside; he was too engrossed in whatever it was he had in front of him. She rolled her eyes and walked over to one of the booths by the window. She wasn't quite ready for coffee just yet, so she didn't need to distract him from whatever it was he was working on.

As she slid into the booth, she pulled her laptop out of her purse and powered it up. She had an article that she needed to get ready for the day after Christmas edition of The Daily Prophet. She was the only sports reporter who was willing to give up her holiday to attend The Christmas Day Peter Pan Cup Swimming Race.

Ginny hated attending races, but she was willing to do whatever it took to get her byline on the front page of the Prophet. Her mother was upset when she told her that she wouldn't be at the Burrow for Christmas, but Molly understood that Ginny's young reporting career was going to take her away from family functions so that she could get her start.

She sighed as she looked at the wallpaper on her computer screen. The last full family photo that they had taken with everyone all together before Fred had passed away. Her heart broke every time she saw the picture of the crew of them, but she knew that he was in a better place and kept an eye on her during her travels.

With a glance out the window at the snow falling, Ginny decided it was time to put her headphones in and get to work on her article. She needed to determine how she was going to make a swimming race article worthy of the front page. At least with her headphones in, she wouldn't be interrupted by anyone else coming into Java Sweets, not that she expected to see anyone else. It was Christmas Day, after all, they all had families to celebrate with.

After what felt like an eternity, Draco stood up from the counter he had been hunched over and stretched his arms over his head. He felt his shoulders pop as he groaned, pulling one arm over his head and then doing the same to the other. He glanced around the front of the shop. Just as he suspected, no one was going to come in on Christmas Day.

As he turned to go grab something to snack on out of the back room, he noticed that there was, in fact, someone sitting in the coffee shop. How did he not hear her come in? She must have been really quiet, or he must have been super focused on the paperwork he was completing. Draco pushed the thought aside and started prepping a drink for her. She had to be thirsty; Merlin only knows how long she had been in here.

"Probably hungry, too," he thought to himself with a shrug. Ginny Weasley's Java Sweets order was one of the most predictable ones he had ever served. The weird thing about her order was that he found himself dreaming about serving her this exact order after a long day when she had been one of the last customers to leave that day.

He looked around for the Darjeeling and Ceylon tea mixture that she usually drank, but couldn't find it anywhere. He cursed the night shift under his breath as he dropped down on his knees to check the cabinets underneath the counter to look for the backup canister. Of course, it was nowhere to be found. Draco had just finished digging through the order that was received last night, and apparently, no one mentioned that they were out of that blend.

Rolling his eyes, Draco knew he had to make a quick decision about what kind of tea he was going to give her. He thought about it for a few minutes and sorted through the blends he saw in front of him, deciding which one was the best replacement. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the Christmas specialty blend sitting on the end of the counter. It was infused with peppermint to give it that unique holiday taste, or so the representatives from corporate had told them when they brought tea into the store.

He reached over and scooped two tablespoons of tea into the infuser and placed it in the mug of boiling water. The next step was two sugars and a splash of milk. Adding the final touches, Draco grabbed a peppermint stick out of the jar and stuck it into her drink. He allowed the tea to steep for three minutes before taking the infuser out and tossing it into the sink. On his way out from behind the counter, he grabbed two gingerbread cookies out of the display case and placed them on a plate.

Carrying the tea and cookies over to her table, Draco set the drink down right beside her computer and placed the cookies toward the end of the table. He slid into the booth across the table and pushed the top of her laptop down on her fingers. The look he received from the other side of the computer made him toss his head back with a laugh.

"Real mature, Malfoy," Ginny grumbled, closing her laptop the rest of the way and rested her hand on top of it. "What if I was working on something that wasn't going to save automatically and I lost everything I had been working on for the last," she paused and looked up at the clock on the wall, "three hours?"

"You've been in here for three hours?" he replied, looking between her face and the clock." How in the hell did I not hear you come in the door? There's a bell on that door for a reason."

Ginny shrugged with a laugh. "You seemed pretty invested in whatever you were working on, so I just claimed my corner booth and got to work. I can't believe I've been working for three hours and still don't have an article ready to submit to the Prophet."

He reached over and grabbed the plate of cookies, placing it gently on top of her hand. "Well, maybe that's because you've been sitting in a coffee shop for three hours without any sustenance. I brought you these gingerbread cookies and a peppermint tea. Apparently, we are out of your usual blend, so I had to improvise. I hope that's okay."

"You didn't have to do that, Draco. I would have ordered something sooner or later." She reached for her computer bag and pulled out her pocketbook. "What do I owe you?"

"It's on the house," Draco answered, crossing his arms over his chest so she couldn't try to offer him money anyways.

"Are you sure?"

He nodded his head. "Think about it as a Christmas present."

"But I didn't get you anything," Ginny replied, frowning as she cocked her head to the side and furrowed her brow. "It hardly seems fair."

"Your company in the shop is all the present I need," Draco replied with a smile. "What's your article on? I might be able to help you get a start on it."

Ginny looked at him for a moment. This wasn't a side of Draco that she was used to seeing. Living in the Muggle world, he had really changed and became a nicer person. She had noticed the change starting after the war, but she had never gotten close enough to see it in person until she started coming to Java Sweets for her daily tea.

She placed the cookies back on the table and opened her laptop. She turned it to face Draco as she reached for the tea he had brought her. It smelled heavenly like she was at the Burrow celebrating with the rest of her family. While she missed them dearly, sitting here in her favorite coffee shop wasn't so bad.

"I was asked to cover the Peter Pan swim race that happened this morning," Ginny replied, sipping her tea. "It was the most boring thing I've watched since sitting through one of Trelaweny's lectures. I wish they'd let me have the Quidditch beat."

"You'd have no issues with that," Draco said with a laugh, leaning forward to look at what she had written so far, which wasn't much. "Do you have any notes from the race? Like maybe who won?"

Ginny thought about it for a minute and then set the mug down on the table to start digging through her bag, looking for the notebook she had taken with her to the race. Once she located it, she extracted it from the bag and handed it to him. "I'll be honest; I didn't take a lot of notes."

Draco took the notebook out of her hand with a raised eyebrow. When he looked at the paper, he noticed that she hadn't taken any notes during the race. All that she had done was doodle along the edges of the paper with squiggly lines and stars. He glanced up at her and shook his head. "This is pathetic."

"What?" Ginny asked, shrugging her shoulders. "It was boring."

"That doesn't mean you don't even write down the name of the winner," Draco sighed, hanging his head. "It looks like you're gonna be here a while, so you start looking for information online about who won the race, and while you're doing that, I'm going to whip us up something to eat."

"You can cook?" she asked, tossing her head back with a laugh.

Draco stuck his tongue out at her and nodded his head. "I've picked up a trick or two. I can't promise that it'll be as good as Christmas dinner at the Burrow, but at least you won't go hungry."

"Thanks, Draco," Ginny said, nervously tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

"What for?" he replied, holding the door to the kitchen open as he waited for her to respond.

"For not making me spend Christmas alone," she answered.

He nodded his head slowly. "I guess I should be thanking you for the same thing."

"We'll call it even," she said with a wink.

"Now that we got that out of the way, it's time for you to get to work and for me to get cooking," he announced, stepping into the kitchen.

Ginny watched him and shook her head. He was right; she needed to find out who had won the race so that she could make up some details as she wrote the rest of it.

At least now, they wouldn't be spending their Christmas Day alone.


End file.
